Australian Tales - Setis

under my arm. But I felt as fidgety as if the sofa and cushions were
stuffed with horse-nails instead of horse-hair; and I was as indisposed to
nap as the anxious captain of a ship on a lee shore, or an invalid next
door to a house on fire. There I lay, wondering whatever I should do if I
lost my dear Ruth, and only getting more perplexed and distressed, the
further I ventured on such gloomy calculations.
“Soon after midnight, the nurse crept softly into the room in her
nightcap, and said very composedly, ‘Now, Mr. Wobble, I'll trouble you
to go for — ’
“ ‘Yes, Mrs. Follidodd,’ I exclaimed, jumping up, and without waiting
for further instructions, I ran off for the doctor. In most towns there are,
as you are aware, a multitude of dogs prowling the streets at night, and
intolerable nuisances they are. It is the morbid nature of mongrels in
general to run after everybody that will run away from them. So I had not
run far before I had some of the yelping brutes at my heels; and the
number increased as I went. Still I was unwilling to waste time by
stopping to kick them. I knew from experience that curs are more noisy
and troublesome if you take notice of them, and they seldom have
courage to bite. So I kept running, and trying to comfort myself with the
latter reflection, and they ran after me, of course, until, as I was turning
an unlucky corner near a butcher's shop, a surly mastiff woke up, and
like all bull-headed animals, he did not stop to consider why he should
join in the melee, but rushed after me, seized a large mouthful from my
apparel, and dispossessed me of kerseymere enough to make a pair of
gaiters, in less time than the smartest tailor in Sydney could have cut
them out. Of course I roared out, for I thought I had lost flesh as well as
cloth, still I did not stop to argue with the brute. Onward I sped, till I
arrived almost breathless at Dr. Dollop's door, and began to ring his
night-bell a regular “bob major,” while the congregation of curs kept up
an irregular bow-wow chorus.
“ ‘Hilloa!’ cried the doctor, putting his head out of his top window,
‘Hilloa! what the dickens are you making all this noise for? Is the town
on fire?’
“ ‘Doct — or, doc — tor!’ I panted.
“ ‘What's the matter with you?’ shouted the doctor, (confound those
horrible dogs.) ‘What do you want with me?’
“ ‘Doc — tor, ma — make haste, co — come with me direct — ly,’ I
gasped, as plainly as I could speak with my short supply of breath.
“ ‘Be off you drunken sot. How dare you bring your filthy dogs before
my house at this time of night?’ roared the doctor, in a very angry tone,
being under the impression that I was some tipsy rat-catcher, and had
mistaken his house for an inn.
“ ‘They are not my dogs, Doctor Dollop,’ I replied, rather tartly, ‘my
name is Wobble. I don't breed noisy curs to annoy my neighbours; nor do